Start with the unfortunate, smirk-inducing name. No, the specialty of the house is not buck-toothed aquatic rodent. Moreover, the name provides absolutely no clue as to what is on the menu.

Then there's the dreary location, a storefront in a beleaguered Tempe retail complex. Step inside, and it's clear the owners haven't been plowing precious capital into the decor. Local art for sale - mostly paintings of flowers - hangs on the walls. There's a sofa that doesn't appear to have arrived new from the factory showroom. You order at the counter, which is flanked on one side by a dessert case and the other by a trash can.

Beaver Choice is pretty much ambience-free.

And then there's the offbeat fare, which doesn't have a natural constituency in this town. It's mostly Swedish. And a bit Polish. And a touch Canadian.

It all reflects the journey of the Gabrielsson family, whose matriarch and cook, Hanna, emigrated from Poland to Sweden to go to university. She spent two decades there, raising a family, before moving to Canada in 2002. (The restaurant's name is a salute to Canada, where the beaver is the national symbol.) The latest move came a few months ago: In search of a climate that would ease her arthritis, she and her husband and sons packed up and settled in the Valley.

Let's hope this is their final stop. Beaver Choice is an absolute charmer: wonderful food at a fair price, proudly served by a good-natured family that's so cheerful they could give friendly lessons to a litter of golden retriever puppies.

You'll notice that the menu doesn't have an appetizer section. Main dishes - most of them come with a hefty side of potato and three vegetables - are hearty enough to see a reindeer through a Scandinavian winter. And if any appetite cracks do remain - or even if they don't - you'll want to seal them up with dessert.

Diners craving ethnic adventure will find dishes they've never encountered, unless they've vacationed in Stockholm or have a Swedish grandmother. Take the exotic flygande Jakob, ($10.25), which might cause even seasoned risk-takers to flinch. It's an eye-opening mix of chicken, mashed potatoes, bananas and nuts, baked in chile cream sauce. I promise you won't be bored. Janssons Temptation ($10.25), meanwhile, is just as one-of-a-kind: potatoes, onions and anchovies layered in an aluminum pie tin, buried under a lava flow of heavy cream and crispy fried onions. It's really good - not at all fishy. It's even better if you can drive all thoughts of calories and fat grams out of your head until you've scraped every last crusty bit of it off the pie-tin edges.

Less flashy, but no less beguiling, are three home-country staples. Think of laxpudding ($10.75) as a Swedish frittata, whipped up with eggs, potatoes, cream and gravlax, salmon cured with salt, sugar and dill. Hanna cures her own - it takes about two days - and the fish is luscious, buttery and flavorful. To get full salmon impact, order the seared gravlax platter ($13.75), a generous portion that comes with terrific homemade shrimp salad that would be the main attraction under almost any other circumstances.

And, of course, there are Swedish meatballs ($10.25). You don't have to be Swedish to enjoy them. You just have to enjoy the dill cream sauce they're smothered with and the lingonberry preserves alongside.

Two beef and pork dishes give you an idea just how much range Swedish cuisine has. Thinly sliced beef sirloin comes lined with mustard and strikingly rolled around fried onions and blue cheese ($14.75). Handsome pork tenderloin ignited with gin - you'll see the flames shooting up in the kitchen - gets kicked up another notch by cream sauce accented with juniper berries ($11.75).

The stick-to-your-ribs Polish dishes are as tempting as the Swedish ones.

The chef calls her muscular stuffed-cabbage plate ($10.25), which comes with two knockout potato pancakes, "Polish farm food." In contrast, pork schnitzel draped in an elegant chanterelle mushroom sauce ($11.75) tastes big-city. And homemade pierogi ($10.50), an occasional special, will make you pine for Poland, no matter where your ancestors hail from. On our visit, the dumplings came stuffed with mushroom and sauerkraut and sprinkled with bacon bits.

But the Polish stunner is the out-of-this-world chicken schnitzel cordon bleu ($11.50), a half-pound breast sliced in half and filled with top-quality ham and Brie, then skillet-fried in butter to a crispy crunch. This dish could safely come with a money-back guarantee.

The Canadian touch? It's poutine ($4.25, small), a comfort-food pile of french fries ladled with cheese curds and brown gravy. Touted as a hangover remedy, it's every bit as tasty (and filling) as it sounds.

The kitchen doesn't let up at dessert. Scandinavian sweets like lemon cream pudding ($3.50), panna cotta with lime and berries ($3.25) and "beaver balls" ($3.50) - oatmeal and chocolate rolled in coconut - are all first-rate. But the aptly named beaver supreme ($3.50) is phenomenal, a confection sculpted out of chocolate and walnut meringue layered with whipped cream and oranges.

A few caveats: You need patience here. The kitchen gets backed up because everything is made to order. Dishes come out when they are ready, so your table may not start and finish the meal together.

And, alas, there are only about 20 seats. As word gets out, Beaver Choice is going to be jammed and slammed. The good news, however, is that there's an empty storefront next door, a logical space to expand. If I were the landlord, I'd start the negotiations today.